What does the world look like? An interlinking, colorful nexus

An art exhibition at the Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center explores current networks

By Margarita Pournara - Kathimerini

If we had to come up with a picture of the contemporary world in which we live, it would no doubt appear before our eyes as a nexus of people, ideas and hopes – all interwoven and dependent upon one other.

Curated by visual artist Dimitris Antonitsis, “Me(n)tal” is on display at the Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center until Saturday. The exhibition includes works by artists exploring the notion of interconnected networks, showcasing abstract, geometric works with the exception of a large-scale descriptive painting by Michael Bevilacqua.

The show opens with an impressive work by Shoplifter, whose previous works include turning the facade of New York’s Museum of Modern Art into a colorful maze of woven hair. Under the title “Aimez vous avec ferveur,” the project was carried out in collaboration with Assume Vivid Astro Focus. For the Athens exhibition, Shoplifter worked on a 6-meter installation featuring, once again, hair on the theme of the bittersweet trap of vanity.

Torben Giehler’s colorful paintings seem like an installation of photographs taken from the sky, with each little box featuring special dimensions, giving them a singular visual impression. Though his works have a “fake” look about them, the artist places them directly on the canvas, without the use of a computer.

New Yorker Michael Bevilacqua – whose works were on display this summer on Hydra – comments on the socioeconomic network of today’s global arts scene. Though Caucasian – and therefore a man raised with certain privileges – he realizes that the artists who are promoted nowadays are those from minorities.

Doug Melini creates geometric kaleidoscopic compositions resembling collages but which are in fact paintings.

Daniel Subkoff uses the canvas as a field for sculpture action, cutting up and developing canvas pieces in space. By tearing up the painting’s surface, he brings to light the work’s backbone, the wooden plexus that keeps the canvas together.

The exhibition ends with a work by Mika Tajima, one of the star artists of last year’s Whitney Biennial. In Athens, Tajima presents a video titled “Grass Grows Forever in Every Possible Direction.”

Ileana Tounta Contemporary Art Center, 48 Klefton & Armatolon, tel 210.643.9466. To January 10.